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Waspinator
2008-08-27, 01:49 AM
I've been thinking about getting the PDFs of issues 320 and 332 of Dragon magazine from Paizo since the whole dragon player character thing sounds interesting. Does anyone have any experience with these "classes" and have any opinions as to how useful or balanced they are?

BobVosh
2008-08-27, 04:10 AM
No clue, alternately you can level a dragon using savage species though. More DMs would allow that. Then again apparently DMs hate savage species, according to this forums, but I don't know why.

Starsinger
2008-08-27, 04:16 AM
No clue, alternately you can level a dragon using savage species though. More DMs would allow that. Then again apparently DMs hate savage species, according to this forums, but I don't know why.

Because savage species is about as well balanced as a one legged unicyclist.

ghost_warlock
2008-08-27, 04:27 AM
I've had players use the red and green dragons. Unfortunately, the red never made it past ECL 5 and the green (ECL 10) I've only seen in a single session (co-DMed my brother's game once).

Personally, I feel that they're a bit underpowered. The breath weapon, which should be awesome as it's one of the main reasons to play a dragon, is rather lack-luster in the damage and how easy the save is to make.

They will have significantly fewer hp than other tank-type characters of equal level, unless the character(s) they're being compared against also have a massive LA.

The two things they do have going for them is the number of attacks they can make in a round and their mobility via flight. They can do some nice damage even though they're doing mostly d4s, d6s, or the occassional d8. Amulets that give their natural attack magical +'s to attack/damage are pretty much a must for these characters, though. Their ability to go from one end of the battlefield to the other, even across large battles, is very hand. I'd strongly suggest players take Flyby Attack to maximise the efficiency of their natural attacks - especially since their breath weapon is oh-so anticlimatic.

WBL for dragon PCs should be spent on amulets to improve their natural attacks first, then other items to boost their stats (Str and Con, particularly), then whatever miscellaneous stuff the player has in mind. Draconomicon has some decent magic items meant for PC dragons that you may want to take a look at.

Falrin
2008-08-27, 04:40 AM
An all dragon party would be cool.

Just take Medium Sized ones. Balance them to each type. And advance by HD.

With some homebrewing you can easely have a diverse Dragonparty without balance issues.

HD is nice to advance, maybe give some semi-class abilities (Faster CL increase, sneak attack , extra feat, rage, ... ) Should be nice.

Jack_Simth
2008-08-27, 06:20 AM
I've been thinking about getting the PDFs of issues 320 and 332 of Dragon magazine from Paizo since the whole dragon player character thing sounds interesting. Does anyone have any experience with these "classes" and have any opinions as to how useful or balanced they are?
I'm not running the rules from Dragon, but I am running A Dragon Campaign (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=68048) with it's own set of rules.

Johel
2008-08-27, 06:48 AM
Then again apparently DMs hate savage species, according to this forums, but I don't know why.

The balancing issue is the main reason. Then, the fact that it's really difficult to conceive a whole campaign for a gobelour. And finally, the CE alignement of most savage species.

For the dragon as a PC, well... anything short of an adolescent dragon would have no reason of going out of its Mom's lair. And if something'd killed the said Mom, chances are hight the pup won't survive it.

An adolescent dragon is a natural 12th level + Classes (which it doesn't really need but...hé...it's supposed to be an adventurer dragon, isn't it ?) + Sorcerer spells + Breath +...you understood my point, here. :smallwink:

Really, really powerfull, really difficult to manage, from a GM point of view as well as from an player point of view. If the player has a "happy trigger" moment, you might as well wrote of this village you spent a hour designing.

Recaiden
2008-08-27, 07:02 AM
The classes seem mostly balanced. You get a few levels of sorceror casting, (5 over 20 levels?). The breath weapon is weak in damage, helped only in the unlimited uses. There's + 5 or +6 LA in there. You could optimize it to be pretty effective.

CASTLEMIKE
2008-08-27, 07:06 AM
Personally, I feel that they're a bit underpowered. The breath weapon, which should be awesome as it's one of the main reasons to play a dragon, is rather lack-luster in the damage and how easy the save is to make.

They will have significantly fewer hp than other tank-type characters of equal level, unless the character(s) they're being compared against also have a massive LA.

The two things they do have going for them is the number of attacks they can make in a round and their mobility via flight. They can do some nice damage even though they're doing mostly d4s, d6s, or the occassional d8. Amulets that give their natural attack magical +'s to attack/damage are pretty much a must for these characters, though. Their ability to go from one end of the battlefield to the other, even across large battles, is very hand. I'd strongly suggest players take Flyby Attack to maximise the efficiency of their natural attacks - especially since their breath weapon is oh-so anticlimatic.

WBL for dragon PCs should be spent on amulets to improve their natural attacks first, then other items to boost their stats (Str and Con, particularly), then whatever miscellaneous stuff the player has in mind. Draconomicon has some decent magic items meant for PC dragons that you may want to take a look at.


I agree there is just to much much LA for what they do to advance as a normal dragon. The only way to really make it work is to use the advanced class level routine. Edit: Dragon Class Only Monster Gestalt on one side of a build could be interesting if all the players do it.

Firefingers
2008-08-27, 07:32 AM
I would consider asking your DM to allow you to play with a smaller level adjustment or some form of LA buyback depending on the sort of campaign, I have played a couple of all monster campaigns which worked out pretty well as all the characters had LA or RHD (minimum 4-7 depending on the campaign) this allowed all characters to feel pretty balanced as we all had the same issues (lower HP than normal characters, fewer class levels so reduced spell casting for the caster types).

Then again I have played some very strange character types including and air elemental wizard familar, the wizard and I both had to take feats for it 3 for me and 1 for him to allow the normal familar rules to apply to me. (Basically Sharing spells, and some other familar powers were made into feats I forget exactly what we did should probably ask the DM again). If you talk to your DM about what you want to do anything is possible as in most cases he will try and help you so that everyone can have fun, sometimes things arent possible but thats more due to it not fitting with the DM's ideas for the game.

Tormsskull
2008-08-27, 07:33 AM
No experience with using those specifically. If you're looking for inspiration or just want to read through some dragons-as-pcs info, I'd suggest looking for Council of Wyrms. Its 2e AD&D but the whole campaign setting is based around dragons.

Pyroconstruct
2008-08-27, 07:41 AM
Dragons as per savage species are horribly, cripplingly underpowered and there's nothing you can do to be effective with them. If you want to play one as something other than "the party's comic relief pet," you'll need to talk your GM into lowering the LA. They look to me like, on the whole, they should be ECL=HD +1 until about 8th level, then ECL=HD (this because they get Flight very early, so at low levels they should probably have an LA for it). Savage Species LAs are just retarded.

Sstoopidtallkid
2008-08-27, 08:40 AM
May I make an unorthodox suggestion? Gestalt, with one side class levels, and the other dragon HD. Ignore LA, and start as a Wyrmling, but it seems like, as long as the entire party is the same power level, it should be fine. CR will be borked, but CR is borked anyways.

Tsotha-lanti
2008-08-27, 10:51 AM
No clue, alternately you can level a dragon using savage species though. More DMs would allow that. Then again apparently DMs hate savage species, according to this forums, but I don't know why.

Feral half-ogres.

'nuff said.


No experience with using those specifically. If you're looking for inspiration or just want to read through some dragons-as-pcs info, I'd suggest looking for Council of Wyrms. Its 2e AD&D but the whole campaign setting is based around dragons.

It wasn't very well-thought-out or even all that cool, really. "So we're dragons. So, uh, what do we do?" "Well, there's other dragons... and I guess you amass treasure." "Whose treasure?" "Er, no clue. It's just dragons all over the islands, I think..." "So we take their treasure?" "No, I think you're all supposed to live in peace, more or less." "What, Evil and Good dragons live in peace?" "Uh... sure?"

Definitely the most lackluster AD&D experience I ever had.

BigPapaSmurf
2008-08-27, 11:45 AM
Yeah, this is just a bad idea plain and simple, 90% of the MM will be useless weakling monsters. Everybody want to be a badass, but it ruins the game. Tarrasque PC's now thats got potential.

MeklorIlavator
2008-08-27, 05:45 PM
What do people think about the method put forward in the Draconomicon? It might work better, plus for high level games the PrC's and Feats are really useful.

Jack_Simth
2008-08-27, 06:02 PM
For the dragon as a PC, well... anything short of an adolescent dragon would have no reason of going out of its Mom's lair. And if something'd killed the said Mom, chances are hight the pup won't survive it.

I created a way around that for my dragon campaign - Mom was killed, but while she had a bounty on her head, there was also a man running around paying through the nose for *intact* dragon eggs (which the man who made the bounty did not address).

Thus, mom falls to a strong adventuring party, but the kids live to hatch in a hatchery of someone else's devising for mysterious purposes.

And, if they ever get overly cocky, it's known that there's adventurers around strong enough that they behead full grown adult dragons.


An adolescent dragon is a natural 12th level + Classes (which it doesn't really need but...hé...it's supposed to be an adventurer dragon, isn't it ?) + Sorcerer spells + Breath +...you understood my point, here. :smallwink:

Really, really powerfull, really difficult to manage, from a GM point of view as well as from an player point of view. If the player has a "happy trigger" moment, you might as well wrote of this village you spent a hour designing.
ECL is in place to discourage monstrous characters. LA and racial hit die means you can't play a full caster very well compared to a standard race.

Now, there's some dragons where the strength and Con adjustments are sufficient that you'll have a better attack bonus than a pure fighter (Very Young and Young Red, Very Young or Young Gold) essentially be a Fighter with some movement modes and a few more attacks - but then you're playing a melee brute with some skillmonky abilities in a > 10th level campaign where the Full Casters tend to dominate.

I found a trick to get around that for my campaign:
The first five "levels" of your ECL are by Monster Manual CR, not Hit Dice + LA + Class Levels, and I started the campaign at level 5, and everyone starts out as a Wyrmling Dragon so they're all on roughly equal footing.

That is, the CR 3 Bronze Wyrmling gets 4 nonassociated class levels (I had my own definition for "associated" and "Nonassociated" - basically, Core classes are nonassociated, PrC's and most non-Core classes are "Associated") at the beginning of play. That set of HD, LA, and Class Levels are considered the base "ECL 5" that later class levels are added to (so 5,000 xp later, said Bronze Wyrmling gets another class level). CR 5 just happens to be the highest base CR of the MM Wyrmlings (not a coincidence). It's worked out reasonably well so far.

RagnaroksChosen
2008-08-27, 07:08 PM
use the rule sin the dragonomicon.. there not bad. Dragons tend to be a little powerfull for there ECL but otherwise tis ususaly prittyy good.. never had to many issue, especialy when the dragons playing a tank or fighter-ish type..

Ulzgoroth
2008-08-27, 07:11 PM
Dragons benefit greatly from using ToB classes, I think. High-HD melee monsters in general, really, but a dragon warblade definitely gets some nice things.

mostlyharmful
2008-08-27, 07:33 PM
Dragon players tend to benefit greatly from playing either Gold, Silver or Bronze from core dragons just because of the alternate form powers, it gives your PC the oppertunity to do so much more and to get into so many more places even before size becomes an issue.

Trizap
2008-08-27, 07:44 PM
hmmmmmmmmm.........dragons as PCs...............simple, design a world where dragons are much more common than usual, and the usual weakling races are more powerful than usual, a simple case of the Law of Protagonist Vs. Challenges: threats to the Protagonist (or in this case, the PC) is always proportional to the PC's power level

Sholos
2008-08-27, 10:04 PM
How's the Krynn setting handle dragons? Since the whole Krynn setting was designed to have a heavy dragon influence.

Tsotha-lanti
2008-08-27, 10:58 PM
How's the Krynn setting handle dragons? Since the whole Krynn setting was designed to have a heavy dragon influence.

Dragonlance (3.5 anyway) has no dragon PCs of any sort (Krynn never has had dragon PC rules, to my knowledge; they're not supposed to be PCs, and it really wouldn't go that well with the tone of the game), and the Dragonrider prestige class doesn't even let you get a good-aligned dragon big enough for a Medium creature to ride until 17th level or so. (Using the Draconomicon can help there, luckily.)

Waspinator
2008-08-28, 12:29 AM
Just to be clear, I'm talking about these, not the Draconomicon or Savage Species:
http://paizo.com/dragon/products/downloads/320
http://paizo.com/dragon/products/downloads/332

And I can think of several reasons why a young dragon might be on its own. A group of humanoids (good or evil depending on what kind of dragon we're talking about) invaded its parents' lair and they held them off while the children escaped. Now they're searching for the ones responsible, trying to get justice/revenge. Or maybe a dragon that was friends with members of another race gave some of its eggs for safekeeping to them and was later killed. Or maybe in the game world you're using, dragons are fairly common and are seen mingling with other races.

OneFamiliarFace
2008-08-28, 12:43 AM
Because savage species is about as well balanced as a one legged unicyclist.

I'll thank you not to bring my father into this.

Anyway. Dragons as PCs? Why not? Just realize your campaign is going to be crazy go nuts.

Waspinator
2008-08-28, 12:51 AM
Of course it'd be crazy weird. If nothing else, the party fighting another dragon could be amusing.

"Who disturbs my slumber? WHO DARES ATTACK RAKGAR THE MIG- wait, Bob? I haven't seen you since Dragon High! How've you been?"

Edit: And I'm thinking that the way to make them work is to not take the "Dragon" class all of the way. Take it to a level where you have decent levels of flight and other dragon abilities and then multiclass into Warblade or Swordsage or something.

OneFamiliarFace
2008-08-28, 01:10 AM
Edit: And I'm thinking that the way to make them work is to not take the "Dragon" class all of the way. Take it to a level where you have decent levels of flight and other dragon abilities and then multiclass into Warblade or Swordsage or something.

That makes sense. Isn't it this very website that has a black dragon assassin? Indeed it was. (http://www.giantitp.com/articles/U2hDQPsRjbwSamZsbE7.html) That makes for some cool builds then. If they go Warblade or Swordsage, then expect a crapton of flyby attacks to take advantage of their standard action abilities. For a martial-type class, Duskblade might be better so they can use all the swift action spells, and it goes with their dragon-esque sorcery.

xelliea
2008-08-28, 03:34 AM
why not i mean if you DM alowes it

Siegel
2008-08-28, 05:14 AM
Dragons can also benefitt really mutch from Totemist levels (as do everything that can't really use items)

Waspinator
2008-08-28, 07:57 PM
Dragons can use some items, they just have to be made particularly for them. I have the sudden mental image of a dragon with a weird backpack stuffed full of wands and potions, though.....

The_Snark
2008-08-28, 09:47 PM
There is, actually, at least one way to play a conventional dragon in D&D without being wholly unimpressive. The key: Don't play a true dragon. Play an abyssal drake (Draconomicon). It's ECL 15, and actually worth its ECL. You get:

-Huge size. When someone asks to play a dragon, they want to play a big dragon, not the little six-foot dragons that normal playable true dragons will be. The drake is comparable to a red dragon, so according to Draconomicon, you are a fifty-foot (stretched nose to tail), ten-ton behemoth.

-All the dragon usuals. High flight speed, natural armor, natural attacks (slightly inferior to an actual dragon's, as you don't get wing attacks and need to find a way to hover in order to use all of them), and high ability scores—enough Con that you won't be far behind a fighter of the same ECL, if you're behind at all; enough Str to make up for the loss of BAB to LA, and for the size penalty, and still leave you a couple points ahead of a fighter. You get minor Wisdom, Charisma, and Dexterity bonuses too, and an Intelligence penalty—doesn't much matter, since you're getting 8 skill points per level (see below). You even get a breath weapon that deals 10d6 damage (not very exciting at level 15, but still worthwhile for occasional crowd control, and the fact that half the damage is untyped is good), and the frightful presence ability. Which is all but useless, but being able to terrorize towns or armies just by flying around might come in handy someday, and it's fun to have the ability.

-A few extras, like resistances to every energy type (plus the Fire subtype, but you get cold resistance), a very nasty poison attack (DC 20 plus whatever you put into Con, dealing 2d6 Con damage per hit), and a rend attack.

Of course, you're not actually a dragon. You're an unholy demon of draconic descent, which combines the traits of a wyvern with that of a red dragon. The Chaotic Evil subtype can make this hard to use in a party, but then, if you wanted to play a character that fit in easily, you wouldn't be playing a dragon.

In any case, whether redeemed, refluffed, or just placed in a game where chaotic evil is an option, it makes for an effective character.

SadisticFishing
2008-08-28, 10:21 PM
Hardest bit in my mind is levelling. Dragons only gain power through aging, and so, do not have any place in a regular campaign.

tyckspoon
2008-08-28, 10:25 PM
Hardest bit in my mind is levelling. Dragons only gain power through aging, and so, do not have any place in a regular campaign.

'Only'? Not at all. They are intelligent beings. They are, by the definition of 'Intelligent being' in D&D, capable of taking classes. The Draconomicon even presents dragon-specific prestige classes. It's just a relatively unused option, because (in-character) dragons are pretty damned badass already and can become more powerful just by taking a hundred-year nap, so there's relatively little reason for them to work at taking on class levels, and out-of-character because a class-leveled dragon will whip a party's ass even harder than an intelligently played one with just the base abilities.

Although it can get a little bit odd if you have a very youthful dragon in a typical campaign, since they're likely to get a dozen levels in a decade (often much faster), so you end up with a Very Young or Young dragon that has as much power as one several age categories higher.

Sstoopidtallkid
2008-08-28, 10:25 PM
I remember a note on the WotC board of a dragon with 7 racial HD and no LA. Not perfect, but Dragon HD are pretty good, so may be useful. I may be able to find it.

Edit:Here. Ambush Drake Savage Progression. (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/fc/20060728a) May be useful, especially if fluffed as whatever color you want.

Waspinator
2008-08-28, 11:47 PM
I actually went ahead and bought the issues of Dragon. If nothing else, it was worth it for the picture of the dragon with a mug in a tavern and the one with another dragon looking thoughtfully at a "Reward: 1000g for the rescue of princess" sign.

I haven't looked at the rules in too much detail yet, but they seem nice. They even give the option between saying "forget how long aging takes!" and just letting the dragon advances age categories as it levels up or instead having it max out an age category and then be forced to multiclass until it's old enough to continue.

dspeyer
2008-08-30, 03:16 PM
The key to playing an effective dragon is to make the RHD useful. They're full BAB, good saves, d12 HD and 6 skills. Wyrmling Brass dragons with levels in rogue, bard, scout or beguiler can be very fun and pretty effective (only 2 LA helps). For melee, you'll probably want gold or silver so you don't take size penalties. For full casting, forget it, though it's a good choice in gestalt.

In a serious campaign, you'll need a backstory to get the parents out of the way. In a more lighthearted campaign, just ignore them.

Keep the ECL moderate. ECL 6 is about as low as you can play, and by ECL 15 or so the primary casters will start dominating (a young gold dragon might fair slightly better against a wizard 20 than a fighter 20 would, but that only means he'll last 2 rounds).

Waspinator
2008-08-31, 03:54 AM
I still like the Wyrmling Warblade idea, though. I may have to stat that out....